When Montreal journalists took bribes from the mayor

Tracy S. Ludington, seen here at
a picnic in LaSalle in 1938

   Montreal Gazette journalist Tracy S. Ludington's long career covering city hall started with a bizarre incident in 1938.
   He reported to the press room at city hall and was approached by the president of the press gallery who gave him a cheque for $250, the first in a quarterly schedule of payments that would total $1,000 a year.
   That was a lot of money back then, of course. For example, you could take an 18 day cruise to South America for $250 in those days.
   The money was meant as a blatant bribe from the Camillien Houde administration. He refused, it but it led to an offer of cash from Houde's assistant Dick Quinn.
   He threatened to write about the offers in the newspaper if they persisted. So  Ludington did not report the widespread bribery of journalists, but when the Chicago Tribune later wrote about the bizarre arrangement he had to point out that he was not involved in the scheme. Such a thing could never, ever, ever happen today, of course.
   Ludington was probably more famous as "the man who sent Camilien Houde to jail," as he explains in this documentary his decision to run the contents of a speech given by the mayor exhorting Montrealers not to go to war if conscripted.